About DESC

Our Vision

Our vision is a community where all people are shown compassion, treated with dignity, and everyone has a safe, stable, and affordable place to call home.

Our Mission

DESC helps people with the complex needs of homelessness, substance use disorders, and serious mental illness achieve their highest potential for health and well-being through comprehensive services, treatment, and housing.

Our Values:

Agency Wide:

  • We believe in finding new solutions by examining problems creatively and do not limit ourselves to doing things the way they have always been done. We share what we learn with others, so that they can gain expertise and understanding.
  • We acknowledge our mistakes and are committed to learning from them, so that we can do better in the future.
  • We believe in the inherent value of every person. It is everyone’s job to speak up when confronted by discrimination or bigotry.
  • We believe the efforts of all staff make client success possible. Cooperation and the willingness to be flexible are the keys to helping our clients overcome the barriers they face.
  • We believe the best decisions are informed by those most impacted by them. We are never too busy to discuss what is right – right for our clients, right for our professional selves, and right for our organization.
  • We believe when employees have a chance to rest and renew themselves through adequate and individualized self care they are better prepared to meet the challenges of their work.
  • Safety is everyone’s responsibility, regardless of position or program. Each of us is responsible for the safety of our co-workers, clients, and the broader community.

Client Services:

  • We choose to work with the most marginalized and most vulnerable people first, not the most cooperative.
  • We believe in the capacity of people to change. Even when our clients display negative behavior or experience failure at meeting their own goals over and over, we do not give up on them.
  • Our goal is to help clients achieve their highest potential for independence, self-determination, and personal responsibility possible.
  • We meet clients where they are currently without judgment, wherever they happen to be in their recovery.
  • We provide services at a pace the client can tolerate. We both accept who they are in the moment and prepare ourselves to help them when they are ready to make changes in their lives.
  • We are willing to take on new challenges when it is the right thing to do.
  • We do not accept the notion that clients choose homelessness or that homelessness is a preferred condition to housing. There is no such thing as an “un-houseable” person.
  • We may issue consequences for a client’s negative behavior and their access to services may be heavily conditioned after a serious situation, but we will always find a way to make sure a client maintains a connection to services at DESC.

DESC is an Equal Opportunity Employer

DESC is committed to diversity in the workplace and promotes equal employment opportunities for all staff members and applicants. The Agency will not discriminate against any employee or applicant for employment on the basis of race, creed, color, sex, gender, sexual orientation, age, national origin, caste, marital status, or the presence of any sensory, mental or physical disability in any employment practice, unless based on a bona fide occupational qualification. Minorities and veterans are encouraged to apply.